Article published in 'Boneshaker' magazine

Monday 17 May 2010

When did you start Jake’s Bikes?Two years ago now. I was very naïve. I saw brokenor badly maintained bikes everywhere and I justwanted to fix them and get more people cycling.I didn’t really think about the practicalities,and at the time I was a freelance web designerand assumed that I could continue to earn myliving from that for a year or two and do bikesa couple of days a week. I always imagined acosy little shed somewhere with a wood stove,where I could do a lot of barter and trade andswaps and charge people almost nothing. Aftera bit of searching I found a small industrial unitin Montpelier, Bristol, in which I could rent acorner. Very quickly it got busy, and within a fewmonths I was doing it full-time.

And so you then decided to move to this largerworkshop space just around the corner?Yeah, well it’s a bit more established now. I am ina larger workshop and so can employ a couple ofother people (workshop assistant Jake & mecahnicPete). When I started out people told me it takesthree years to get a new business off the ground andI didn’t believe them, but they were right. I reckonby the end of our third year in business I should beable to pay myself a living wage, but it turns outthat it really does take that long.

What sort of work do you do?Mainly maintenance, servicing and repairs. Ithelps keep old bikes on the road and helps keeppeople cycling. We also sell reconditioned usedbikes and build a few special bikes to order. We

work almost entirely on fairly practical bikes forcommuters and utility users: hybrids, city bikes,tourers and so on. To be honest, it’s cycling as aform of transport that I’m really interested in.

Are there many bike workshops similar to yourselvesbased in the UK?As far as I know, there are very few bike recyclingoperations in the UK that aren’t charities and/or externally funded in some way. The OxfordCycle Workshop has been going for a number ofyears now and I understand does pretty similarwork to us on a larger scale and South CoastBikes in Brighton also run an appointment-onlyworkshop but don’t sell used bikes or do anytuition. I do think that ours is a model that I’dlike to see copied in other cities, and as cyclingbecomes more popular I think it will be. Peoplesometimes talk to me about ‘the competition’from other bike projects or bike shops but Idon’t really see it that way. We currently helpThe Bristol Bike Project where we can, who arebased right nextdoor to us and I was pleased tosee a new independently-run bike shop open justdown the road in St. Werburghs.

As well as repairing and selling bikes, I also heardthat you were offering bike maintenance classestoo, is that right?Yeah, just recently actually we’ve started runningtuition and evening classes. There are a seriesof bike maintenance sessions for people whowant to learn how to fix their own brakes orgears, and also a real beginners class for novices:how to fix a puncture - that sort of thing. Forthose who want to do more in-depth stuff likea complete bearings service or wheel build, wedo one-to-one tuition. We’ve also just started aweekly drop-in session on Thursday eveningsfor people to come along and fix up their ownbike using our workshop and tools which isideal for customers who have some experiencebut need a little guidance or want to use themore specialist tools, and I hope it will makebike servicing affordable even for those on avery tight budget.

Your sign says you work by appointment only - whyis that?Yes, this causes some confusion! Jake’s Bikes isnot a shop – it really is specifically a workshopand when we’re busy working on customers’bikes it’s difficult to handle retail sales. We’d haveto employ shop staff for that, and frankly I’mjust not interested in selling the latest widgetsand gizmos to punters on the high street. So wehave an appointments system like a car garage.Customers book a time slot to drop their bikeoff and discuss what work needs doing, andthen we can give a much more accurate estimateof when the job will be done.

EDIT: Please note that since this article was

written we have been able to dispense with the

appointments system thanks to moving to new

premises and taking on another member of

staff. You're still welcome to make an

appointment for workshop work or tuition if

you like, but there's no longer any need to

arrange purchases or bike viewings in advance.

It’s funny that in Britain we see bikes as justanother consumer item that you buy froma high street shop. Cars have proper servicecentres and garages that work by good old fashionedappointments systems. Why not forbikes as well?

On that note, how do you think we can actuallychange the way we look at bikes in Britain andmake them more appealing and acceptable as ameans of valid transportation and therefore getmore bums on seats?Well, I think it’s all about normalising cycling - we have to get society to recognise bikesas a legitimate, normal form of transport forthe masses instead of just a sporting or leisureactivity for the few and there are a whole lotof things on many levels that we can slowlychange to bring about this shift. For example,we need better cycling facilities, a wider rangeof sensible, practical city bikes and cycling gearand properly integrated cycle planning - notjust a few hastily tacked-on cycle lanes. Wealso need petrol to be more expensive – whichis lucky because that’s going to happen in anycase and we need social demand for localisation,eco awareness and healthier and safer cities –which, again, we are slowly but surely startingto see. Ultimately we need a shift away fromcar culture and towards cycle culture. Then, notonly will drivers and policy makers and townplanners start to see bikes as real road vehicleswhich have to be respected and given space, butalso cyclists themselves will become normalisedas responsible road users.

The trouble is that these things take time andit’s easy to get despondent or burnt-out whenplugging away at cycle campaigning. Here andnow, one of the most effective actions is simplyto directly get more people cycling. The CTC’sSafety in Numbers campaign (www.ctc.org.uk/safetyinnumbers) shows that the more people

cycle, the safer it is for each individual cyclist,

and the more political and social will exists toimprove cycling conditions. Then all the rest willfollow. The more people cycle, the more cyclingwill be seen as being normal, so it becomesself-perpetuating.

This really is the ethos behind Jake’s Bikes -one by one, we work on getting more ‘normal’people cycling; and it seems that if certainindividuals become customers, they can act as agateway to other members of their peer groups.For example, we’ve built up a few nice touringbikes in the past, and customers have headed offto France and Spain and had the time of theirlife. They then become something of a cyclingevangelist and before you know it a couple oftheir friends turn up here in search of second handbikes.

Most are enthusiastic young male students, butwe have had several older ladies, each of whomreferred the next one to us, rediscovering thejoys of cycling just as soon as we had supplied

them with suitably high handlebars or low gearratios or a step-through frame. Even with girlsin their late teens or early twenties, amongstwhom cycling rates are notoriously low, as soonas one in their social group gets a stylish bike thebarriers start to break down and cycling beginsto become acceptable or even normal. You canreally see it when a customer, who six monthsago was a complete novice, turns up on a well usedbike talking knowledgeably about the bestcycle route to work!

I guess it’s also about showing people who rely onhaving a car as a means of transporting stuff that itcan also be done within reason on a bike, right?Yeah, absolutely – it’s about leading by example.When we use a bike trailer to collect and pickup bikes, it always attracts a lot of looks andcomments, mostly positive, and in a smallway it helps to show that it’s possible to carrycargo without a car or van and makes peoplethink “maybe I could do that”. And lastly, it’salso about being positive, that’s so important.I’ve learnt that negative messages almost alwaysdon’t work. Making someone feel bad abouttheir carbon footprint or lack of exercise doesn’thelp; supplying them with a bike and enablingand empowering them to use it does.

It seems obvious from reading on your websiteabout your environmental policies that the ethicsof Jake’s Bikes is extremely important to you – howdifficult is it running a business whilst still stayingtrue to these ideals – do you have to make a lot ofcompromises?Yes and no. It’s not as if I was already running a bikeshop which I decided to try and make a bit ‘greener’,so in a way it’s not difficult at all. The whole pointof Jake’s Bikes is the social and the environmental.I used to work at CAT, the eco-centre in Wales,and then for a couple of other environment andclimate-change related organisations, so by now Iguess it’s pretty ingrained in me, but I’d becomea bit jaded and cynical about environmentalcampaigning, and working on bikes is a greatway of doing something positive and tangibleboth environmentally and socially, instead of justbanging on about how screwed the planet is.The really gratifying thing is that the ethical stanceof Jake’s Bikes is paying off, so I feel that kind ofjustifies my idealism. Customers definitely likethe ethical stance, and some became customersas a result of reading our policies on the website.I think that in an age when everything isdisposable and fast-paced and technology-heavy,it’s really important to show that repair and reuseof old stuff is still possible and socially acceptable.

The very existence of Jake’s Bikes in itselfdemonstrates the viability of running a recycling based,environmentally-friendly business. But I’mnot pretending it’s all easy. Buying stock ethically isdifficult. Unfortunately there's just no such thing as

local, organic, fair-trade bike components. All we can

do is re-use or recycle as much as possible and buy

much of our new stock from a family-run supplier. New

components which wear out quickly are also tricky.

Wherever possible I try and persuade people to gofor the long-lived option rather than the lightest orthe cheapest, and there are plenty of things whichI simply refuse to stock on the grounds that they’rejust not designed to last. But the truth is thatmodern bikes simply don’t last as long as thirty orforty-year-old ones, and it pains me to have tosell stuff which I know will end up in landfill infive years time, but what else can we do? I comfortmyself with the thought that it’s for the greatergood: at least it’s helping people to cycle, and evena bike which wears out quickly is still a whole lotbetter than driving a car!

Lastly, what does 2010 hold in store for Jake’s Bikes?Well lots of things I hope! I wouldideally like to be running more in-depthbike repair classes; having courtesy bikes forcustomers to borrow whilst their own is beingserviced; having a fleet of affordable long-termhire bikes so that people can try cycling for a fewweeks or months without committing toanything; hiring out cargo bikes, work bikesand bike trailers of the sort that people wouldn’twant to own themselves but would want to usefrom time to time; having a community pool ofquality kids bikes that could simply be tradedin for the next size up as your child grows...the list of possibilities is endless, and I wouldbe delighted if other businesses or organisationsjoined in. What’s important is not that Jake’sBikes grows to do all these things, but just thatit all happens somehow.